LDnet is organising a special session at this year's annual conference of the RSA in Santiago de Compostela on the topic of "Strengthening the impact of research on EU local development policies".
One of the objectives of the next period’s EU funding is contributing to a Europe closer to citizens
by fostering the sustainable and integrated local development and … [Read more...]

The proposals of the European Commission regarding Community-led Local Development (CLLD) and Leader were published before the Summer. In the following note Urszula Budzich-Tabor distils the main proposals and offers a comparison with the 2014-2020 period.
However, not everything is 100% settled and, as Jean-Pierre Vercruysse has commented, there are some proposals in the … [Read more...]

In May 2018, the European Commission published its proposals for CLLD/LEADER in the post-2020 period. The overall impression is that these proposals, broadly speaking, amount to a continuation of the approach and rules applying to CLLD/LEADER in the current, 2014-2020 period.
But as already noted by Robert Lukesch in his 'LEADER RELOADED' paper, there will be a fundamental … [Read more...]

The workshop on "Local development strategies: retaining and attracting talents in the regions" took place on Thursday 11 October 2018 in the framework of the European Week of Regions and Cities. Organised by LDnet as lead-partner, in cooperation with ELARD, CIM Alto Minho and AEIDL, it offered a forum for the presentation of concrete experiences from different countries … [Read more...]

In this wide-ranging paper Robert Lukesch goes back to the precursors of Leader and looks at each stage of its evolution, highlighting the complex principles behind this approach (“more than the seven features and usual clichés”) and discussing success factors. He takes us to the current CLLD/Leader period and looks at what lies ahead. He debates whether CLLD/Leader has become … [Read more...]

The RSA Annual Conference 2018 took place in Lugano, Switzerland from 3rd to 6th June on the theme of "A World of Flows: Labour Mobility, Capital and Knowledge in an Age of Global Reversal and Regional Revival". As part of the Conference, "Policy Tuesday" on 5th June focused on issues and inputs concerned with place-based policies. LDnet organised a special session on "What … [Read more...]

The general assembly of the LEDA Partenariat - Local Development Network association took place at on 10 October 2018 in Brussels in the offices of AEIDL at 260 Chaussée Saint-Pierre, 1040 Brussels.
Among the topics discussed at the assembly was the strengthening links between practitioners and researchers. LDnet's activities in the last year have much to offer in this … [Read more...]

FARNET and FAME Support Units have developed a handbook on evaluating Community-Led Local Development (CLLD) at the local level. This handbook is addressed to all Local Action Groups (LAGs) funded from one or several of the four ESI Funds and it provides them with easy-to-use tools and methods. It covers the main steps in evaluating Local Development Strategies (LDS): planning … [Read more...]

The avalanche of proposals for the 2021-2017 period is continuing. On 29.05.2018 the European Commission published its proposal for a new Common Provisions Regulation [COM(2018) 375 final] which confirms the continuation of CLLD although uncertainties remain – and we’ll return with a critical review.
Title III, Chapter II of the new CPR deals with Territorial Development, … [Read more...]

In his contribution to the International Seminar Social Innovation in Public Policies in Brasilia, on 7 and 8 March 2018, Robert Lukesch discusses the essence of social innovation at the micro level and highlights the importance of governance (“the very notion of social innovation requires an institutional environment which is at least not punishing deviating behaviour”. He … [Read more...]

CLLD is more often associated with a rural or fisheries context. In this paper by Pietro Verga deals with ‘urban CLLD’, which builds on experiences, particularly, from the URBAN Initiatives and the LEADER programme. His research is based in Berlin and is within the policy context of the German Soziale Stadt programme (Socially Integrative City, SIC).
Fostering both physical … [Read more...]

LDnet is cooperating with AEIDL supporting a joint internernship in Brussels. Noémie Bessette, student of Sciences-Po Rennes (France) started her four-month internship working on a number of tasks. A key topic of her internship concerns Community Led Climate Action (CLCA) in the EU, as outlined below.
Since its establishment in 1988, AEIDL has focused its attention mainly on … [Read more...]

About LDnet

LDnet is an informal network set up in 2011 to bring together knowledge and people in local development.
People who wish to make a contribution to local development can participate in the network.
LDnet is supported by the non-profit LEDA-LDnet Association. The aim of the Association is "to develop and spread knowledge and expertise enabling … read more